Festivals Extra: Comic-Con Badges Sell Out
Mainstream media and comics outlets alike noted the now-yearly phenomenon of near-instant sell-out of badge for Comic-Con International. It took about 90 minutes. I'm sure many people were frustrated just as many folks were delighted. I have not heard of either specific instances of grievous malfeasance nor a general rumble of negativity surrounding Saturday's registration attempts. Let me add my voice to the chorus of others that are telling you that there is a chance if you were counting on attendee badges for July you might be able to find some re-offered through official and semi-official channels in late May, and there's always the option of focusing on a fun comics show that isn't San Diego, such as that company's own WonderCon next month.

I suspect this is going to be a year where you're going to see pushback from a lot of comics pros that decide to make a bigger deal out of not attending -- a big chunk of pros have always skipped the show -- as well as continued growth in things to do outside of the convention proper. Comics is in this odd place of actually being more stable and more healthy in some ways -- some ways -- than the scramble of Comic-Con International might indicate, by which I mean I think you'll find a lot of publishers and established pros going to that show with roughly the same goals in mind they had in 2008 (I seem to be still having the same four breakfasts, the same Thursday night and the same Friday night I did a decade ago), and I don't think that continuity is true for a lot of media companies and almost certainly isn't true for that show's big, recent generator of furtive energy, the industry that's popped up around "nerd culture."

Like I said Saturday, congrats to those that scored badges and I hope to meet some of you in July. I'll be the older, nerdy guy.